by Diana Palmer
“He doesn’t use the good place settings at home,” Gwen said dryly. “He likes plain white ceramic plates and thick Starbucks coffee mugs and just plain fare to eat. He isn’t a fancy mannered person, although he can blend into high society when he has to. He’ll think of it as a welcome relief from the D.C. whirl. Which I’m happy to be out of,” she added heavily. “I never liked having to hostess parties. I like working in law enforcement.”
“Me, too,” Rick said, smiling warmly at his wife. “I’m just sorry about what happened to you and Ames.”
“Yes. Have we heard anything about Ames?”
“Cash Grier said that he regained consciousness this morning,” Barbara said with a smile. “It’s all coming back to him. He remembered what the men looked like. He got a better view of them than you did,” she told the younger woman. “He recognized Fuentes.”
“Fuentes himself?” Gwen was shocked. “Why would he do his own dirty work?”
“Fuentes knows that you’re married to me, and that I’m General Machado’s son,” Rick said somberly. “I think he was trying to get back at the general, in a roundabout way. He may have thought it was me driving. He wouldn’t have known that you were with Ames.”
“Yes,” Barbara said worriedly. “And he may try again. You can’t go anywhere alone from now on, at least until Fuentes is arrested.”
“He won’t be,” Rick said coldly. “Dozens of policemen have tried to pin him down, nobody has succeeded. He has a hideout in the mountains and guards at every checkpoint. An undercover agent died trying to infiltrate his camp a few weeks ago. I’d love to see him behind bars. It’s trying to get him there that’s the problem.”
“Well, your father’s not too happy with him right now,” Barbara remarked.
“And the general has ways and means that we don’t have access to,” Gwen agreed.
“True,” Rick said.
“I think we may hear some good news soon about Fuentes and his bunch,” Barbara said. “But for now, my main focus is getting your wife back on her feet,” she told her son. “Good food and a little spoiling always does the trick.”
“You’re a nice mother,” Rick said.
“A very nice mother and I’m so happy that you’re going to be mine, too,” Gwen told her with a warm smile. She shifted in the bed and groaned.
“Time for meds,” Barbara said, and went out to get them.
Rick bent and kissed Gwen gently between her eyes. “You get better,” he whispered. “I have erotic plans for you at some future time very soon.”
She laughed, wincing, and lifted her mouth to touch his. “You aren’t the only one with plans. Darn this rib!”
“Bad timing, and Fuentes’s fault,” Rick murmured as he brushed her mouth tenderly with his. “But we have forever.”
“Yes,” she whispered, beaming. “Forever.”
Thanksgiving came suddenly and with, of all things, snow! Rick and Gwen walked out into the yard at Barbara’s house and laughed as it piled down on the bare limbs of the trees around the fence line.
“Snow!” she exclaimed. “I didn’t know it snowed in Texas!”
“Hey, it snowed in South Africa twice in August,” he pointed out. “The weather is loopy.”
She smiled and hugged him, still wincing a little, because her rib was tender. She was healing quickly, though. Soon, she would be whole again and ready for more amorous adventures with her new husband.
“Is your father coming down?” he asked Gwen.
“Oh, yes. He said he wouldn’t miss a homemade Thanksgiving dinner for the world. He can cook, but he hates doing it on holidays, and he mostly eats out. He’s very excited. And not only about the meal,” she added with an impish grin. “I think he likes your mother.”
“Wouldn’t that be a match?” he mused.
“Yes, it would. They’re both alone and about the same age. Dad’s quite a guy.”
“But he’s head of a federal agency. He lives in D.C. and she owns a restaurant here,” Rick pointed out.
“If they really want to, they’ll find a way.”
“I guess so.” He turned to her, in the white flaky curtain, and drew her gently to his chest. “The best thing I ever did in life was marry you,” he said somberly. “I may not say it a lot but I love you very much.”
She caught her breath at the tenderness in his deep voice. “I love you, too,” she whispered back.
He bent and drew her mouth under his, teasing the upper lip with his tongue, parting her lips so that his could cover them hungrily. He forgot everything in the flashpoint heat of desire. His arms closed around her, enveloping her so tightly that she moaned.
He heard that, and drew back at once. “Sorry,” he said quickly. “I forgot!”
She laughed breathily. “It’s okay. I forgot, too. Just another week or two, and I’ll be in fine shape.”
He lifted an eyebrow and looked down at her trim, curvy body in jeans and a tight sweater. “I’ll say you’re in fine shape,” he murmured dryly.
“Oh, you!” She punched him lightly in the chest.
“Shapely, sexy and sweet. I’m a lucky man.”
She reached up and kissed him back. “We’re both lucky.”
He sighed. “I suppose we should go back inside and offer to peel potatoes.”
“I suppose so.”
He kissed her again, smiling. “In a minute.”
She sighed. “Yes. In a minute…or two…or three…”
Ten minutes later, they went back inside. Barbara gave them an amused look and handed Rick a huge pan full of potatoes and a paring knife. He sighed and got to work.
The general came with an entourage, but they were housed in the local hotel in Jacobsville. General Cassaway did allow his adjutant and a clerk to move into Barbara’s house with him, with her permission of course, and he had a case full of electronic equipment that had to find living space as well.
“I have to keep in touch with everyone in my department, monitor the web, answer queries, inform the proper people at Homeland Security about my activities,” the general said, rattling off his duties. “It’s a great job, but it takes most of my time. That’s why I’ve been remiss in the email department,” he added with a smile at Gwen.
“I think you do very well, considering how little free time you have, Dad,” she told him.
“Thanks.” He dug into the dressing, closing his eyes as he savored it and the giblet gravy. “This is wonderful, Barbara.”
“Thank you,” she replied, with a big smile. “I love to cook.”
“Me, too,” Gwen added. “Barbara’s teaching me how to do things properly.”
“She’s a quick study, too,” Barbara replied, smiling at her daughter-in-law. “Her corn bread is wonderful, and I didn’t teach her that…it’s her own recipe. She’s very talented.”
“Thanks.”
“What about this Fuentes character who sideswiped that car you were in?” he asked Gwen suddenly.
“Strange thing,” she replied, tongue in cheek. “Fuentes seems to have gone missing. Nobody’s seen him since the wreck.”
“How very odd,” the general remarked.
“Isn’t it?”
“How about the young man who was driving you?” he added as he dipped his fork into potato salad.
“He’s out of the hospital and back at work,” Gwen said warmly. “He’s going to be fine, thank goodness.”
“I’m glad about that.” He glanced across the table at Rick. “I understand that your father has left Mexico.”
Rick smiled. “Yes, I did hear about that.”
“So things are going to heat up in Barrera very soon, I would expect,” the general added.
Rick nodded. “Very soon.”
“No more talk of revolution,” Barbara said firmly. She got to her feet with a big grin. “I have a surprise.”
She went into the kitchen and came back in with a huge coconut cream pie. She put it on the table.
“Is that�
��?”
“Coconut cream.” Barbara nodded. “I heard that it’s someone’s favorite.”
“Mine!” General Cassaway said. “Thanks!”
“My pleasure.” She cut it into slices and put one on a saucer for him. “If you still have room after all that turkey and dressing…”
“I’ll make room,” he said with such fervor that everyone laughed.
The general stayed for two days. Rick and Gwen and Barbara drove him around Jacobsville and introduced him to people. He fit in as if he’d been born there. He was coming back for Christmas, he assured them. He had to do a vanishing act to get out of all those holiday parties in Washington, D.C.
Rick heard from his father, too. The mercenaries had landed in a country friendly to Machado, near the border of Barrera, and they were massing for an attack. Machado told Rick not to worry, he was certain of victory. But just in case, he wanted Rick to know that the high point of his life so far had been meeting his own son. Rick had been overwhelmed with that statement. He told Gwen later that it had meant more to him than anything. Well, anything except marrying her, of course.
They moved back into her apartment, because it was closer to their jobs, leaving Rick’s vacant for the moment.
She went home early one Friday night and when Rick walked in the door, he found her standing by the sofa wearing a negligee set that sent his heart racing like a bass drum.
“Here I was trying on my new outfit and there you are, home early. What perfect timing!” she purred, and moved toward him with her hair long and soft around her shoulders, her arms lifting to envelope him hungrily.
He barely got the door closed in time, before they wound up in a feverish tangle on the carpet…?.
Chapter Eleven
“Your ribs,” Rick gasped.
“Are fine,” Gwen whispered, lifting to the slow, hard rhythm. Her eyes rolled back in her head at the overwhelming wave of pleasure that accompanied the movements. “Oh, my gosh!” she groaned, shivering.
“It just gets better…and better,” he bit off.
“Yes…!” A high-pitched little cry escaped her tight throat. She opened her eyes wide as he began to shudder and she watched him. His body rippled in the throes of ecstasy. He closed his eyes and groaned helplessly as he arched up and gave himself to the pleasure.
Watching him set her own body on fire. She moved involuntarily, lifting, lifting, tightening as she felt the pleasure grow and grow and grow, like a volcano throwing out rocks and flame before it suddenly exploded and sent fiery rain into the sky. She was like the volcano, echoing its explosions, feeling her body burn and flame and consume itself in the endless fires of passion.
She couldn’t stop moving, even when the pinnacle was reached and she was falling from the hot peak, down into the warm ashes.
“No,” she choked. “No…it’s too soon…!”
“Shhhhh,” he whispered at her ear. “I won’t stop until you ask me to.” He brushed her mouth with his and moved back into a slow, deep rhythm that very quickly brought her from one peak to an even higher one.
He lifted his head and looked down at her pretty pink breasts, hard-tipped and thrusting as she lifted to him, her flat belly reaching up to tempt his to lie on it, press it into the soft carpet as the rhythm grew suddenly quick and hard and urgent.
“Now, now, now,” she moaned helplessly, shivering as the pleasure began to grow beyond anything she’d experienced before in his arms. “Oh, please, now!”
He pushed down, hard, and felt her ripple around him, a flutter of motion that sent him careening off the edge into space. He cried out, his body contracting as he tried to get even closer.
They shuddered and shuddered together, until the pleasure finally began to seep into manageable levels. He collapsed on her, his body heavy and hard and hot, and she held him while they started to breathe normally again.
“That was incredible,” she whispered into his throat.
“I thought we’d already found the limit,” he whispered back. “But apparently, we hadn’t.” He laughed weakly. He lifted his head. “Your rib,” he said suddenly.
“It’s fine,” she assured him. “I wouldn’t have felt it if it wasn’t fine,” she added with a becoming flush. She searched his dark eyes. “You’re just awesome.”
He grinned. “So are you.” He lifted an eyebrow. “I hope you plan to make a habit of meeting me at the door in a see-through pink negligee. Because I have to tell you, I really like it.”
She laughed softly. “It was impromptu. I was trying it on and I heard your key in the door. The rest is history.”
He kissed her softly. “History indeed.”
He started to lift away and she grimaced.
“Sorry,” he said, and moved more gently. “We went at it a little too hard.”
“No, we didn’t,” she denied, smiling even through the discomfort.
He led her into the bedroom and tucked them both into bed, leaving the clothes where they’d been strewn.
“We haven’t had supper,” she protested.
“We had dessert. Supper can wait.” He pulled her into his arms and turned out the light. And they slept until morning.
Christmas Day brought a huge meal, the whole family except for General Machado, and holiday music around the Christmas tree in the living room of Barbara’s house. Rick and Gwen had bid on the nearby house and the family selling it accepted. They were signing the papers the following month. It was an exciting time.
Barbara and General Gene Cassaway were getting along from time to time, but with minor and unexpected explosions every few hours. The general was very opinionated, it seemed, and he had very definite ideas on certain methods of cooking. Considering that he’d only started being a chef five years before, and Barbara had been doing it for years, they were bound to clash. And they did. The more they discussed recipes, the louder the arguments became.
Gwen had resigned her federal job, with her father’s blessing, and was now working full-time as a detective on Rick’s squad at San Antonio P.D.
Her fledgling efforts had resulted in murder charges against Mickey Dunagan, the man arrested but not convicted on assault charges concerning a college coed. He was also the subject of another investigation on a similar cold case, in which charges were pending. He’d been seen at the most recent victim’s apartment before her death in San Antonio.
Faced with ironclad evidence of his guilt, a partial fingerprint and conclusive DNA matching fluids found on the victim’s body, he’d confessed. A public defender had tried to argue that the Miranda rights hadn’t been read, but the prisoner himself had assured his legal counsel that he’d been read them, and that he stood on his confession. He’d started crying. He hadn’t meant to hurt any of them, but they were so pretty and he could never even get a girl to go out with him. He’d killed that other girl, too, because she’d made fun of him and laughed.
This girl he’d just killed, she’d been kind. He didn’t care if he went to prison, he told Gwen. He didn’t want to hurt anybody else.
She’d handed him over to the prosecutor’s office with a sad smile. A murderer with a conscience. How unusual. But it didn’t bring the dead women back. On the other hand, the cold case squad was feeling a sense of satisfaction. They owed Gwen a nice dinner, they told her, and would deliver any time she asked. She also spoke with the parents of the dead women, and gave them some consolation, in the fact that the killer would be brought to justice and, most likely, without a long and painful trial that would only bring back horrible memories of the tragedies.
The San Antonio patrolman, Sims, who’d gone on stakeout with Rick and Gwen, had been resigned from the force suddenly, with no reason given. Nobody in the department knew what had happened.
Patrolman Ames in Jacobsville was happily back on the job and with no apparent ill effects.
Down in Barrera, there were rumors of an invasion. It was all over the news. General Cassaway, when asked about the truth of those rumors, j
ust smiled.
Gwen handed Rick a wrapped gift and waited patiently for him to open it.
He looked inside and then back at her with wonder. “How did you know…?”
She grinned and nodded toward Barbara, who laughed.
“Thanks!” he said, pulling out a DVD of an important United States vs. Mexico soccer match that he’d had to miss because of work. “I’ll really enjoy it.”
“I know you saw the results, but it was a great game,” Gwen said.
“Here. Open yours,” he said, and handed her a small present.
She pulled it open. It was a jeweler’s box. She pulled the lid up and there was a small, beautiful diamond ring.
He pulled it out and slid it onto her finger. “I thought you should have one. It isn’t the biggest around, but it’s given with my whole heart.”
He kissed it. She burst into tears and hugged him close. “I wouldn’t care if it was a cigar band,” she said.
“I know. That’s why I wanted you to have it.”
“Sweet man,” she murmured.
He sighed. “Happy man,” he added, kissing her hair.
She looked up at him with eyes full of love. “You know,” she said, glancing toward her mother and General Cassaway, who were looking at recipe books they’d given each other, “I think this is the best Christmas of my life.”
“I know it’s the best of mine,” he replied. “And only the first of many.”
“Yes,” she said, smiling from ear to ear as she touched his cheek with her fingertips. “The first of many. Merry Christmas.”
He kissed her. “Merry Christmas.”
The sudden buzz of his cell phone interrupted them. He reached into his pocket with a grimace. It was probably a case and he’d have to go to San Antonio on Christmas Day…?.
He looked at the number. It was an odd sort of number…?.
“Hello?” he said.
“Feliz Navidad,” a deep voice sang, “Feliz Navidad, Feliz Navidad, something-somethingy felicidad!”
“You forgot the words?” Rick laughed, delighted. “Shame! It’s ‘Feliz Navidad, próspero año y felicidad,’” he added smugly.